While lives and livelihoods have been hit, so has life satisfaction

In an earlier article, we argued that as the COVID-19 pandemic continues, we need to add a third “L” to the mantra of safeguarding “lives and livelihoods”. In addition to these two priorities, we also need to focus on people’s life satisfaction. Ultimately, we don’t just aspire to have a life and a livelihood, but to have a long and happy life. In other words, it is not just quantity, but also quality, that matters.

Most of my readers know by now which factors explain the difference between someone who is happy and someone who is miserable. Spoiler alert: it is not money, even though money does matter, in complicated ways. Not surprisingly, the biggest differentiator is mental health. More surprisingly, the second most important driver is job satisfaction. (Much) more on that here. After these, relationships and physical health also play a critical role.

I thought it would be interesting to see whether these patterns show up in country level data on life satisfaction, especially in the context of COVID-19. During the pandemic, Eurofound has run three surveys at different points in time to canvass how content people in each country are with their lives. [Note: since the UK is no longer a member of the EU, it is not included in these statistics.] The last set of data points are from March 2021, roughly a year since the arrival of the pandemic on the continent.

The chart above (and below*) shows the results. Even though individual-level data will be necessary to draw any real conclusions, I find these patterns interesting and important. They indicate, indeed, that money — at least when measured by a country’s total output (GDP) is not really correlated with changes in life satisfaction (left hand panel of the chart). This is nothing new, but given the enormous dips in GDP in 2020, it is still fascinating. [* For ease of access, I will normally include the same chart in the header and at the end of each post.]

What, then, has made people less happy with their lives? Certainly, if you ask British people (which the Office for National Statistics does, on a weekly basis), the lack of freedom that comes with social distancing, lockdowns and other restrictions has been one of the biggest concerns. This same phenomenon is also visible in the second panel of the chart. In countries and in time periods where lockdowns were at their most stringent, life satisfaction — relative to a base level in 2016 — was the lowest. [Note: each of the bubbles represents an EU country at a particular point in time during the pandemic.]

This kind of high-level correlation analysis can only ever be indicative. Nevertheless, the fit between lockdown stringency and reductions in life satisfaction is statistically robust, with an R-squared of 32% and a P-value of 0.003. [This means that 32% of all variation in the drops in life satisfaction is explained by lockdown stringency, and that there is less than an 0.3% probability that this finding is due to chance. In other words, there’s a 99.7% probability that there is an actual relationship between the two variables.]

Looking at the evolution of life satisfaction over time also gives some clues to what is going on. After an initial shock in April 2020 (the first survey), things got better towards the end of the summer (second survey). However, while the economy posted a strong bounce back by the first quarter of 2021, life satisfaction dropped significantly (third survey). Some of this could be a seasonal effect — and of course there are bound to be dozens of other variables involved, too. But the dissatisfaction is likely to be at least partly due to the newly tightened COVID-19 restrictions at this time.

There might also be an element of “lockdown fatigue” at play, or a sense of disappointment and frustration that the crisis was not over by now. I have not looked in detail at the psychological effects of the crisis, but we know from other studies (and, indeed, the ONS data — see e.g., 29 March here) that fear, anxiety, loneliness and uncertainty have all taken their toll. Some of these factors are likely to have a cumulative effect: the longer the rollercoaster nature of the pandemic continues, the less resilient we may all feel.

So, to summarise: life satisfaction has dropped drastically in most European countries since the pandemic began. To use the over-used word, the magnitude of this drop really is unprecedented. There will have been several reasons for this, but the most important message is this: pandemic-related restrictions are having a real, detrimental, and significant effect. It is not enough to safeguard lives and livelihoods: the quality of life also matters.

Note: This blog is part of my #dataisbeautiful series, showcasing interesting data in hopefully beautiful charts. If you like it, please “like”, share or comment! For example, if you’d like to see an interactive version, where you can hover over the dots to see which dot belongs to which country and time period, do let me know.